Rooftops
by squeakyfingers
Summary: Sometimes she felt like she lived in a fishbowl. CG Friendship, UST.


Rooftops

By: Allison

Disclaimer: Not my players, just my playground.

Category: Angst, CG friendship UST

Rating: PG-13

Spoilers: Not really, vague references to everything up through season 4.

A/N: A one-parter for the alphabet challenge, Letter R.  A little angst because, well, we all need teh Angst. First songfic in awhile…so we'll see how it goes.  I really should get back to those chapter fics soon…Song is "Brick" by Ben Folds Five.

Summary: Sometimes she felt like she lived in a fishbowl.

+++++++

// 6 am, day after Christmas  
I throw some clothes on in the dark  
The smell of cold  
Car seat is freezing  
The world is sleeping  
I am numb //

'Everything looks so small from up here,' she thought as the wind whipped past her, causing her hair to dance wildly about. The whole world looked like ants from where she stood up on the rooftop of the CSI building. Little ants, so tiny that she could squash them with her finger. Pity, it wasn't like that in reality—that it was just a trick of perception. Everything was all just one big head game, really. God was just screwing with humankind, screwing with her. 

And it was definitely working. 

Up here everything looked and felt microscopic. Down there Catherine felt like the one in the glass fishbowl, with no place to move or go or even breathe. On occasion she even felt like unwanted, unsightly people invaded her fish bowl. They tried to take it over, and claim it for their own. 

She had to fight tooth and nail for every single piece of her life, and it was so incredibly fucked up. It almost felt worthless.

// Up the stairs to her apartment  
She is balled up on the couch  
Her mom and dad went down to Charlotte  
They're not home to find us out //  
  


When had it started? When would it end? 

As she fingered the slim cigarette that was between her thumb and forefinger, she realized she didn't know the answer. At least to the first question, anyway. She could take two mores steps forward, off of the ledge and she would answer her second one.  Two steps, two seconds and she could free-fall into oblivion. All these years she investigated death, she tried not to think about what would happen when she died, and now she found it staring at her in the face.

And it didn't scare her.

_// And we drive  
Now that I have found someone  
I'm feeling more alone  
Than I ever have before //_

She always thought that it would. All those years married to Eddie… all those nights coming home to meet his fists. She remembered fearing it then. He'd instilled it in her. Maybe now that he was gone, it was gone too. She wasn't really sure. 

_// She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly…_

_Off the coast and I'm headed nowhere… //_

She wasn't sure of anything anymore.

// She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly…. // 

Rummaging around in the pocket of her tan leather jacket, she ran a finger over the lighter nestled at the bottom before swiftly pulling it out. One flick and the orange flame danced in the air just long enough for her to light up. Smoking was a habit she'd kicked four years prior, one of the things she gave up after her and Ed were separated. It wasn't because she had her lungs to think about, but because she wanted to be independent. Nothing was going to hold her back, keep her down. She didn't need anything, or anyone.

"You only live once," she muttered to herself, cigarette between her lips, before taking a long deep drag.

It was true. You only lived once in Vegas. Everything was win or lose. You had one shot; no looking back, before you found that life had passed you by.

// They call her name, at 7:30  
I pace around the parking lot  
Then I walk down to buy her flowers  
And sell some gifts that I go t//

"Cath…you up here?"

'Grissom' she thought idly to herself, breathing smoke out into the night air. She wondered when he'd find her. She'd caught a ride with him to work, since her car broke down the week before. Needless to say, she couldn't really afford to fix it now.

Briefly she wondered if she should humor him and let him find her, but decided against it. He was a scientist, an investigator; he could do it on his own.

"Cath, I know you're up here."

She could hear his footsteps as he clambered around the roof in search of her. "You're ice-cold gil," she mumbled, taking another drag of her cigarette.

"I thought you quit." The voice was closer; almost close enough to where she could feel his breathe against the back of her neck.

"Well I smoked before Eddie and I were married, and I was deliriously happy. I was thinking, maybe it was the cigarettes."

"You smoked while you were married too. From what I can tell, you weren't so happy then," her replied, slowing moving his way to her.

Catherine crushed out her cigarette, the remaining embers falling tragically down on the city below her. "You're always the one stamping out a perfectly good theory," she told him bitterly, throwing the words over her shoulder. "What brings you to this rooftop to shatter my illusions, anyway? Are you going to give me another one of your lectures?"

"What lectures?"

"Gil don't be so innocent…the 'your jeopardizing the lab' speech…you can save your breath, you know. It's not like it matters anymore anyway." 

"What's that supposed to mean?" 

"It means in ten seconds I change your life, and mine. Forever. That's what it means." There was shuffling behind her, and hands clawing at the smoky air, churning it like a tornado as they whipping madly until around till they found themselves wrapped around her arms.

"Tell me Grissom, do you feel lucky?"

// Can't you see  
It's not me you're dying for  
Now she's feeling more alone  
Than she ever has before… //

She watched as Grissom stared blankly back at her. At this point she'd come to expect that kind of response from him. The Grissom who was concerned for his job. The Grissom who loved his tarantulas. The Grissom who had no idea what the outside world was like, because he never bothered to lift his had up out of the sand.

"Cath, what the hell are you doing you?"

// She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly //  
  


"That depends…"

"On what?"

"On whether or not you let go of my arm."

// Off the coast and I'm heading nowhere  
She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly…. //

"Cath I'm not letting until you tell me what's going on with you." She saw a change in his eyes, saw then soften before her and she knew her own steely glare was softening as well.

"Life, Gil…that's what's going on with me. Something you seem to know little about these days."

"It's not like I haven't tried…you're not telling me anything either, Cath. Maybe I could help you if you would talk to me."

Catherine sat down on the rooftop, pulling him down with her. "I didn't think you wanted to talk."

"Then you were wrong." He grinned at her, dropping her arm and snaking his around her shoulder. She felt herself lean against him, her tired body melding into his. He smelled like cigarettes and old spice…though she knew the musty aroma of smoke on him was her doing.

"I hate you," she sighed, brushing a stray hair from her face. "You come out here, all high and mighty…who do you think you are, trying to sweep me off my feet? I'm too old for it now."

"Cath, you're never too old for it, never."

"Well I feel like I am."

"Then you're fooling yourself."

"You're just trying to cheer me up."

"Is it working?"  Catherine's head was in his lap now, Gil's fingers lightly stroking her long strawberry blonde locks. 

"For now," she replied softly, smiling.

"This can't last forever, you know."

// As weeks went by  
It showed that she was not fine  
They told me "Son, it's time to tell the truth"  
And she broke down  
And I broke down

'Cause I was tired of lying //

"Why not?" It was more of a statement than a reply.  A half-hearted attempt to recapture something they had thought they lost already and keep hold of it. 

"We can't just sit up here forever, we have lives down there, Cath. You know responsibilities, jobs, families…"

"Mortgage payments, debts, fights …yea there's a lot down there, Gil. Sometimes I wonder if you see it all."

"I see it, I just don't deal with it in the same way you do."

"I don't deal with it at all…you stopped me from doing that."

"It sounds to me like you're giving up."

"Maybe I am." Catherine was tired of fighting; of being strong…she told herself once, that she'd struggle until the end if meant being happy, funny she hadn't reached that point yet. She didn't think she ever would.

// For the moment we're alone  
She's alone  
I'm alone  
Now I know it //

"You've worked too hard to give up now, honey. You're not wired that way."

"I'm too tired too keep going Gil. I've tried, lord I've tried…you've no idea…I just can't do it anymore."

Exhaustion laced her voice; she felt herself wanting to drift off to sleep at the mere thought of remembering the past year and half…at the thought of facing her life and trying to put it all back together. She just wanted to shut her eyes and forget all of it.

"I'm just not strong enough, Gil." She muttered, eyes slowly closing.

"Then let me be strong for you."

// She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly  
Off the coast and I'm heading nowhere  
She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly //

Fin.


End file.
